Fantasy sports: Can't open season without a bullpen

Saturday

Mar 29, 2014 at 7:30 PMMar 29, 2014 at 7:32 PM

Ozzie Smith has joined with Budweiser to drum up support for a petition that seeks to make baseball's Opening Day a national holiday. They did not get it done this year, however, which is just as well for I'm not sure when the day occurred.

It may have been March 22 when the Dodgers and Diamondbacks quietly started the season in Australia. Time zones would have confused the holiday issue then, though. According to my computations, when it was March 22 here, it was 1973 in Sydney.

Then again, Opening Day could be tonight, when the Dodgers again get a head start on the league by playing today's one game that counts when they travel to San Diego. That is after Astros play an exhibition this afternoon against El Aguila de Veracruz today. That is Spanish for "this is your punishment for being the sport's worst franchise."

Or the official holiday wish may really center on tomorrow when 13 games are played, some even in the middle of the day to trick us into believing it is actually spring.

No matter when one marks the day, it has (or is about to) come upon us, so I must complete my preseason look at the fantasy landscape. So here are some passing thoughts on relief pitchers, the position that requires the least attention.

If you are one of those owners who like to jump upon a reliever early, you can't go wrong with Atlanta's Craig Kimbrel. He saved 50 games last year with a 1.21 ERA and 0.88 WHIP and struck out 13.16 batters per nine innings.

You can't count on 50 saves a year from anyone, but if he takes a dip and ends up at 40, that still isn't too bad.

Greg Holland is probably better than most realize, even though closer is a spot where someone who plays for Kansas City can actually garner attention. He compares favorably to Kimbrel with 47 saves, 1.21 ERA, 0.87 WHIP and 13.84 K/9 last season. The Royals now just need to keep winning enough games to make him interesting.

Your upper tier should also include the Dodgers' Kenley Jansen (13.03) and Trevor Rosenthal (12.90), whose K/9 numbers are astronomical enough to make them stand a good chance of being longtime closers.

The Reds' Aroldis Chapman has an even more stratospheric number and would be in this group if he didn't take a line drive to the face. His strikeout rate of 15.83 borders on legendary and only slips him into the second tier even if he misses the first month of the season.

This situation highlights the biggest truism of the closer position in fantasy — possession is 9/10ths of the battle. If one has an opportunity to earn saves, he has immediate value. So for that first month, the Reds' J.J. Hoover will be sucking up some unexpected fantasy attention.

Since the closer-by-committee approach has never worked, this also means each team presents you with someone valuable, even if it is a name with which you are not familiar. So be aware that the Brewers have someone named Jim Henderson in their bullpen.

His scouting report says he does not have wonderful stuff, but he still posted a 2.70 ERA in 61 games last year, saving 28 games and striking out 75 in 60 innings.

Joakim Soria's stalwart days may be behind him — he saved 115 total games from 2008-10 — but now that Joe Nathan is closing games for the Tigers, the Rangers are giving Soria a chance to see if he still has it.

Even the Astros will have someone try to save the few close games they win. The best bet as to who that someone is appears to be Chad Qualls. Hey, he saved 24 games for the Diamondbacks in 2009, no reason he couldn't do it again at age 35, right?

OK, some closers have minimal value. But it is still value.

Streak toward millions

Since the season is about to get into full swing (puns are cool, right?), I would like to take up a little space at the end of the column to steer you all toward mlb.com's Beat the Streak game.

I have done this for a few years, but this time it's sponsored by Dunkin' Donuts, so I believe we're obligated, as New Englanders, to play.

It is a simple concept — pick a player every day and hope he gets a hit to string together a streak of your own. If you get to 57 games and beat Joe DiMaggio's historic streak, you win $5.6 million.

It's not the $1 billion that was put up for a perfect NCAA bracket, but the MLB website trumpets that this contest is six trillion times easier to win.

I'm just going to trust them and say that math works. My calculator broke figuring out that time zone problem earlier.